This invention concerns underwater photography, and particularly relates to remote controls for a digital camera contained in a waterproof underwater housing. The invention relates in particular to the problem of selecting desired settings for the camera while diving, involving settings that require navigation through a menu tree to reach the desired selection.
For underwater photography, divers typically use a camera mounted in a specifically designed underwater camera housing, sealed against intrusion of water. To operate the camera a waterproof mechanical plunger or lever might be provided to activate the shutter, and still cameras typically have an auto focus feature. In the case of movie cameras, these often are provided with a hand-held remote device not only to activate filming but also for selection of photography settings. These include, among many others, a white balance function. In underwater photography the blue-green color of the water acts as a filter that removes much of the red, orange and yellow light, to a greater and greater extent with depth. A diver photographing in daylight must reset white balance with every approximately five feet of depth change. The problem is that a typical video camera requires about six menu selection steps to reach and reset the white balance feature. This requires the diver, viewing the camera's monitor screen or a special monitor built into the back of the underwater housing, to use buttons including an arrow key to execute five or six selections or key entries. The entries must be made in a sequential path with delays as the camera processes and responds to each entry.
In prior underwater camera housings the buttons or keys such as present on a particular camera, or present on a remote device provided for the camera, have been reproduced or incorporated in a handle or handles for the waterproof camera housing. The diver thus went through the required sequence of steps using the buttons incorporated in the handle, while watching the video monitor screen (the camera housing has a back monitor that reproduces the image on the camera's monitor). A wireless protocol such as infrared typically is used for communication between the handle/remote device and the camera.
Needed adjustments to underwater photography camera settings are cumbersome and time consuming for divers, and this is particularly true in the case of function settings that must be made fairly frequently, such as the white balance setting. This concern is addressed by the present invention described below.